Listed on the back label as "dry," the 2015 Riesling opens with honeycomb, dried mango, candied orange peel and candied ginger with a peculiar note of dried mushroom/umami. Medium-bodied, there’s perceptible sweetness in the mouth balanced by bright acidity. It’s got lovely flavors of candied peach and ginger, very exotic, finishing long with lots of flavor. 1,000 cases produced.

The 2014 Riesling from the Willamette Valley offers mango and pineapple scents on the nose, a touch of brioche and dandelion surfacing with time. The palate is clean and fresh on the entry, with bitter lemon mixed with green apple and pear notes. Moderate depth in the mouth and not overly complex, although there is good salinity on the finish.

The 2012 Riesling comes from five or six vineyards around the Willamette Valley. There is a pleasant reduction on the nose that lends it a Clare Valley like character, but it is quite intense with attractive kerosene notes coming through. The palate is medium-bodied with racy acidity that underpins the citrus fruit complemented by touches of lemongrass. Fine.

The Brooks 2010 Riesling – issuing from Brooks Estate, Sunset View, and Cambus Bellas vineyards and not released until this year – displays alkaline and (to my mind prematurely) fusil notes on the nose so as to create a slightly dank impression. Tart green apple, brightly juicy lemon, and piquant lime peel flavors contrast with hints of caramel and canned peach. The feel is glassy and the finish hard, malic – almost a bit metallic – with its tartness detached, and to my palate not really refreshing. Although the winery thinks of his as a wine not only suited for late-release but also for cellaring, I’d drink it soon. I tasted this July with Brooks winemaker Chris Williams, for more detail about whom – as well as about the history and current operating procedures of this estate – consult my issue 202 report. (Wines from Williams’ own small but exciting Terue project can also be found – under that name – in the present report.) As had been the case last year, I found the Rieslings on which this estate puts great stock and about which a number of my journalistic colleagues have written flatteringly were not nearly on the impressive level of the Brooks Pinots – or indeed of their recently-introduced Gewurztraminer from Columbia Gorge fruit. (Because my views on Brooks Rieslings might be considered contrarian, I have elected to publish full tasting notes on certain wines whose ratings would ordinarily have relegated them to a mere mention in my text and to listing as “also recommended.”) “I try not to ever chaptalize,” says Williams – whose low-alcohol (at times astonishingly so) 2011 and 2010 vintage Pinots testify to his resolve under the greatest imaginable temptation – though he confesses that “I had to water-back a couple of lots from 2012 that would have just been big, huge monsters; but, man, I struggled with that because I had never, ever done it; and I’ve never done acid-addition either.” (Could you guess that Williams isn’t at all sure the already much-ballyhooed 2012 Pinots will prove more exciting than his 2011s?!) Incidentally, a new winery is planned for a vineyard location a short distance from the present facility, the old Eola quarters being noticeably cramped. Tel. (503) 435-1278

Surprisingly, the Brooks 2009 Riesling represents their currently-available vintage; and what’s more a single-vineyard and a decidedly sweet bottling that costs more, proved far less successful. Fusil oils mingle with apple, lime and orange zest in a nose typical for many New World renditions of this grape, with tart, bitter, and subtly stony elements well-integrated into a sappy, succulent, buoyant mid-palate. This finishes simply but with admirable persistence and will almost certainly be best consumed over the coming year, lest that petrol tone and bitterness subsequently gain the upper hand. Portlandian Jimi Brooks was among Oregon’s path-breakers and most prominent proselytizers for biodynamic viticulture, and when in 2004 death cut to a mere half dozen years tenure as director of his own winery, his sister Janie Brooks Heuck and assistant winemaker Chris Williams determined to perpetuate the Brooks legacy and style, until such time as control of the estate falls to Jimi Brook’s son Pascal, now 16. An enormous diversity of fruit sources was and remains integral to the Brooks program, but a source intimately associated with Jimi Brooks’ career – the 20-acre Eola-Amity Hills Vineyard planted to Riesling and Pinot in 1974 by pioneers Don and Carolyn Byard – changed hands to become the Brooks Estate Vineyard in 2009. Fruit for Brooks Pinots is always de-stemmed, receives two or even three weeks of cold soak (or is that even the right word in such a case?!) in a refrigerated chamber; ferments spontaneously (de rigeur for biodynamists); is extracted via both punch-downs and pump-overs; and typically spends 18 months in barrel. Tel. (503) 435-1278